Showing posts with label Germany. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Germany. Show all posts

Jun 19, 2025

Questionable provenance research practices at Bavarian State Painting Collections

According to a June 17, 2025 article in  Süddeutsche Zeitung, the Bavarian State Painting Collections and the Ministry of Culture have been engaging in questionable provenance research practices concerning Nazi-looted art. Members of Parliament are asking questions and demanding answers (see  Süddeutsche Zeitung: Bayerns Umgang mit NS-Raubkunst: Taskforce „Nichtstun“ by Jörg Häntzschel) 

Questionable provenance research practices by the Bavarian State Painting Collections and the Ministry of Culture include:

Withholding findings and failing to inform heirs The museums kept most of their provenance research findings to themselves and did not inform the descendants of the Jewish collectors who had been robbed
Failure to publish works in the Lostart database Many works suspected of being looted art were not published in the Lostart database, despite the obligation to do so since 1998. While 598 works are now online, 222 of these were only added in the last four months, compared to 376 in the preceding 24 years.
Delay and obfuscation The Ministry and museums are accused of sticking to a course of delay and obfuscation regarding restitution.
Claiming that "claims where the claimants were known" were not entered into Lostart The State Painting Collections' spokesperson stated that works with known claimants were not entered into Lostart previously, as the database was intended for heir searches. This practice has since been changed for "maximum transparency," but it meant that works like Ernst Barlach's busts, whose heirs were known via Alfred Flechtheim's lawyer, were not listed.
Providing incorrect provenance histories online The provenance histories available online are not always accurate. For instance, it's suggested that Picasso's "Fernande" might have been purchased by the Wallraf-Richartz Museum, a crucial detail for the looted art question, yet documents indicate the museum never paid for it. This is considered a "trick to conceal Alfred Flechtheim's ownership".
Missing provenance information for some works For other works, such as Beckmann's "Portrait of Quappi in Blue," provenance histories are entirely missing from the Pinakotheken's online collection.
Using unusual classification standards The State Painting Collections reportedly used classification standards that are otherwise unusual.
Minimizing the forced nature of exchanges The State Painting Collections interpreted disparaging remarks by former Director General Ernst Buchner about "artistically indifferent" and "entirely dispensable" deposit pictures used in an exchange with the persecuted Jewish Lion brothers as mere "strategic formulations" related to his collection strategy, rather than evidence of the unfair value of the exchange or persecution-related confiscation.
Denying comprehensive access to files The Ministry explicitly denied comprehensive access to all files to the lawyer representing the Flechtheim heirs, stating it was "not necessary".
Lack of proactive communication with heirs The State Painting Collections never informed the Flechtheim heirs' lawyer about two Barlach busts, even though they knew he represented the heirs, and he only learned about them from Lostart.
Lack of transparency with owners regarding looted art suspicion Owners of works, such as the Friends of the Pinakothek der Moderne, were not informed for years that their paintings (e.g., Fernand Léger's "Le Typographe") were classified as suspected looted art, despite internal checks and classifications (yellow, then orange).

Minister deciding alone on restitutions Unlike most other federal states in Germany, the minister in Bavaria decides alone on restitutions, which raises questions about transparency and process.
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(summary constructed in English with NotebookLLM)
from source:

 Süddeutsche Zeitung: Bayerns Umgang mit NS-Raubkunst: Taskforce „Nichtstun“ 17. Juni 2025

Bayerns Kunstminister Blume versprach nach dem Skandal um Raubkunst an den Staatsgemäldesammlungen eine „neue Ära der Wiedergutmachung“. Doch sein Ministerium und die Museen scheinen am Kurs des Verzögerns und Verschleierns festzuhalten.

Von Jörg Häntzschel

https://www.sueddeutsche.de/kultur/bayerische-staatsgemaeldesammlungen-ns-raubkunst-blume-verzoegern-li.3270455?reduced=true

see English translation at 

See also:

Facing accusations of hiding Nazi loot, Bavaria pledges more research and greater transparency, The Art Newspaper https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/02/26/facing-accusations-hiding-nazi-loot-bavaria-pledges-more-research-greater-transparency

NS-Raubkunst-Skandal in Bayern: Verheimlicht und verschleppt https://taz.de/NS-Raubkunst-Skandal-in-Bayern/!6070973/

Jüdische Erben: »Bayern hat uns betrogen« - Claims Conference spricht von »Vertrauensbruch« https://www.juedische-allgemeine.de/kultur/juedische-erben-bayern-hat-uns-betrogen-claims-conference-spricht-von-vertrauensbruch/










Mar 23, 2022

German Museums that do NOT publish Nazi-era provenance online as of March 23 2022


According to our tests, the following German museums are rated "F" (FAIL) for transparency concerning the ownership history of artworks in the Nazi-period 1933-1945.

This means that a visitor to the museum's online collections website cannot see where a painting was or who owned it during the Nazi period.

(Please help us to update this list as museum websites evolve.)


There is a field "Herkunft". However it does not give the ownership history. It only states who sold, gave or loaned it to the museum. There is no link to or mention of Lostart, Linz or Munich Collecting point information. 


There is no ownership history. There is no link to or mention of Lostart, Linz or Munich Collecting point information. 

 

There is a field "Zugang". However it does not give the ownership history. It only states who sold, gave or loaned it to the museum.  There is no link to or mention of Lostart, Linz or Munich Collecting point information. 


  • WALLRAF-RICHARTZ-MUSEUM & FONDATION CORBOUD
  • No real online collections database, no provenance on the Wallraf-Richartz website - not even for iconic works like Asparagus (about whose Nazi-era provenance artist Hans Haacke famously did an entire exhibition). To find information about the history of artworks one must go to LostArt.de or plunge into Immunity from Seizure documents. And yet, provenance research projects have been announced with great fanfare. But whatever the results are, they do not appear to be on the website.


     cc

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    Sep 24, 2021

    Pinakothek Munich: artworks with no provenance transferred from the German state


    Where to find the provenance of artworks held at the Pinakothek in Bavaria, Germany?

    Not, it seems, on the Pinakothek website.

    Frequently, the information provided in the Origin or Herkunft field limits itself to the mention: "on loan" or "transferred from the German state".

    But there is no link or reference to any further information. 

    Yet we know that many looted artworks returned to Germany after the war and then distributed to museums "on loan" or as "transfers").

    How to verify whether or not an artwork held at the Pinakothek is referenced in the LostArt.de database, the DHM Munich or Linz databases?

    To find out, we will look at a selection of artworks at the Pinakothek, many of which are "on loan" or transferred from State possession.


    See file here 


    Download CSV here


    (please note: The dataset contains only a few hundred artworks out of the more than 8000 artworks created before 1940 that contain the word "Überweisung")

    https://www.sammlung.pinakothek.de/en/search?phrase=Überweisung#filters={"yearRange":{"min":1400,"max":1940},"onDisplay":false,"publicDomain":false}

    May 30, 2021

    Gurlitt: The scandal continues

    When an art historian sees the Gurlitt name in any text, the first thought should be: is it a lie?

    CIR 4 LINZ S. Lane Faison describes Hitler's Linz museum as "a monument to Safe Art"

    From June 1945 until the spring of 1946, Faison, Plaut, and Rousseau detained and interrogated hundreds of Nazi officials and collaborators on the whereabouts of looted works of art. - Monuments Men Foundation

    May 29, 2021

    "Special Nazi law covered the seizure of Jewish and enemy property." - CIR 4 Chapter IX Conclusions and Recommendations

     "Special Nazi law covered the seizure of Jewish and enemy property."

    Excerpt from Art Looting Investigation Unit Consolidated Interrogation Report Number 4: Linz